


I'm sorry Steve

by devilinthechurch



Category: The Avengers - All Fandoms
Genre: M/M, blah this is rambly and stupid blah
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-10
Updated: 2012-04-10
Packaged: 2017-11-03 09:44:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/380036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthechurch/pseuds/devilinthechurch
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony's arc reactor finally gives out. Cue sad and angsty Steve feels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm sorry Steve

It had hit all of them by surprise.  
All of them.   
But mostly Steve.  
Especially Steve.

It had happened so quickly, no one had seen it coming. As sudden as a comet in the night sky and as rapid as a flutter of a butterfly's wings, he was gone. Forever.  
The arc reactor had taken its final toll on his body and he'd just collapsed. There was no time to give him CPR, to take him to the hospital. Just like that, his body shut down.   
He remembers how it all happened. They had had a marvellous couple of days. On the final day Tony brought him breakfast in bed. It was one of the best breakfasts Steve can ever remember having. Then they went out for lunch and for a walk in the park. To their favorite picnic spot. They just lay on the grass watching the sky, trailing fingers and hands down each others bodies and planting soft kisses all over. They had gotten to the front door of HQ when Tony hugged him and held him tightly. One of those airtight hugs people give when they are trying to squeeze every single ounce of love out, like there is no tomorrow and that is their last waking moment. It was. He held him and planted a long, passionate kiss on Steve's mouth. "I love you Steve Rogers. Since the very first day I saw you and if I'm perfectly honest I cannot fathom why you've stuck by me all this time. Thank you." were the last words he said as he gave him the smile that could make his heart instantly melt. A solitary tear trailed down his cheek and he fell to the ground.   
The surprise Steve felt in those final moments could only be equaled by the devastation. His cries could surely be heard up to the penthouse, because the rest of the team came rushing down as fast as in-humanly possible.   
They had tried everything. All the known forms of CPR in the world, Thor had tried his magic and Natasha had pressed presure points.   
Nothing.  
He lay there, on the New York city streets, the same smile he had given Steve a short while ago still on his lips, the remnants of a solitary tear on his cheek and the arc reactor no longer glowing in his chest.  
Helpless, Steve remained on his knees, screaming out Tony's name in teary-eyed agony, pounding into the pavement with his bare fists untill he drew blood and the rest of the team had to restrain him, mainly with the help of Thor's godly strength.  
He averted his frustration onto Thor's chest and pounded into him as every one of them closed in around them and held each other closely and tightly, as if afraid the ghastly claws of death were still lingering to promptly snatch away another one of them.

~~~

After that, much had changed in the team. Steve isolated himself. His teammates sought after him, trying to coax him out, help him with the coping process, call upon him as captain. He replied to them that there is no more "Captain". Captain America, with all his talent and strength and virtues died the day Tony Stark took both their hearts to the grave. And there it was to stay, until his soul could join them.

He spent most of his time in the gym. Practically all of it. Punching his punching bag and when it flew off the hinges, the wall, untill Fury would sent someone over to replace it. Then it was the punching bag again.  
He needed to let out his anger.  
At the arc reactor for failing.  
At destiny for making it so.  
At his heart for not having let him die right there on the pavement, with Tony.  
At the world.  
At everything.  
He felt like his heart was on the verge of exploding into a million pieces and at least the violence helped a bit.  
Untill they locked him out of the gym for fear of him causing too much damage. To himself mainly.  
They said he should maybe talk to someone, to help him deal with the loss. The pain. 

He didn't.

Instead, he went to the place he had dreaded to visit from day one. And which was now, with everyone avoiding it like the plague, empty.

Perfect in its torture and beautiful in its sadness, he resolved to lock himself in the only place where no one would think to search for him.

Tony's lab.

~~~

At first, when he entered the keycode that opened the door and fired up JARVIS, his knees suddenly gave way and he collapsed on the floor weeping silent tears that, summed up, could fill up the Earth's oceans twice over. Shaking and crying he remained there an untold amount of time, untill he half regained his composure. Then he propped himself up against Tony's desk and, sensing he was feeling better, JARVIS asked "Anything I can do for you sir? Anything at all?"   
Wow. Tony really put the "Intelligence" in "Artificial intelligence" he thought with a somewhat bitter smile and a stabbing pain in his chest, which he had accepted would always be there as a sharp reminder of Tony's absence.  
No. No there was nothing anyone could ever do for him. Not even himself.  
So he did the one thing, he shouldn't have done. How very Tony, he though again, the pain in his chest growing increasingly larger until he thought he would suffocate from it.  
"JARVIS.. Pull up. Tony's picture files... On the hologram please."  
"..........................................sir? Are you sure that's a good idea?" Smart computer he was indeed.  
"No, JARVIS. No I'm not. But pull them up anyway."  
Steve almost thought he could hear JARVIS sigh with compassion, or maybe he was losing his mind after all, as he summoned all of tony's picture files to appear on the computer. His eyes trailed over them and abruptly stopped, gazing at a particular folder titled simply, "Steve".   
With a shaky hand, he unsurely opened it, partly from fear of his emotions but mainly because he still didn't quite know how to operate Tony's computer, even after all this time. He selected one of the folders at random, because whichever picture he saw would make no difference. They would all shatter his heart into a million tiny pieces and at the same time make him so extremely happy that at least he was seeing some sort of projection of the face of the man he had so dearly loved.   
The folder he had opened happened to contain his favorite pictures ever. It was them, lying under the shade of a giant tree somwhere, gazing up at the sky.   
Tony had taken the picture, or rather, the little flying robot camera he had designed to capture moments, with no need for posing or awkwardness had. A magnificent invention.   
He flipped through the pictures. Folder. After folder. After folder.   
After each picture he could feel the pressure building up in his chest. Untill it became unbearable and tears began to well up in his eyes and flow in a cascade down his cheeks, soaking his shirt. Still he flipped through the pictures, countless memories flooding his brain and heart at every one. The pain in his chest reached a level he had not thought even remotely possible and he could distinctly feel a crack form, down the length of his already tarnished heart. With every picture, every video, every memory, it formed another crack. And another. And another. What did it matter now? All he wanted to do was move on but at the same time he desperately feared forgetting Tony. Forgetting anything. That's why he was going through the pictures. He wanted every single memory to remain completely intact. As if it were frozen. Frozen in ice.  
But it had suddenly become too much to bear as he reached the photo album containing the pictures from their last day toghether. They had been no doubt transferred by the little robot cam and now spread out in front of him, covering the entire holographic area.   
It was too much to bear and so he clicked the exit button and collapsed onto the floor once more. Curling into the fetal position he let the tears flow with even more force as they had before, muttering a series of words, out of which, the more predominant was "why".   
He reached out with his hands and grabbed the pieces of paper that had been scattered around the desk. Holding them tightly towards his body, as though all of Tony's thoughts and ideas could somehow penetrate his skin and become part of him. As if he could carry more of Tony with him. More. More than he already did. Not enough. It wasn't enough. And if the ideas would have done as he had wished and flowed into his skin it still wouldn't be enough. And if they had lived a hundred thousand years and spent every waking moment together it still wouldn't be enough. Not enough. Never enough.  
He glanced at the pieces of paper through teary, red-rimmed eyes. Schematics, graphs and charts and chemistry and maths and things he did not understand and "Steve" and physics and...... "Steve?"

STEVE

It was written in Tony's unmistakable handwriting on one of the papers he was clutching in his hand.

He stopped crying and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand. Sitting upright, he blinked at the letter. And then he blinked again. He grabbed it and turned it over and pinched himself just in case.   
No. It was definitely there.  
Mustering up all the courage he could find, he, with trembling hands and still somewhat incredulously, unfolded the letter.   
On the top right corner, there was the date. The exact same day of Tony's death, and under it written, in Tony's neatest possible handwriting:

"Dear Steve,

if you are reading this then I'm probably gone by now. And if I know you half as much as I would like to think, then probably long gone. Hah, dead and I can still predict your every move. Soul-mates or what, huh?  
I imagine you are a little bit taken aback at this letter. Yes, I did write it. Yes, that is the date of my death on the top right corner. Yes. I had meant for you to find this.

The truth is; I'm sorry.  
And this is an explanation as much as it is an apology.  
Th truth is, I've known. For a long time now, that I was going to die.  
So have the rest of the team. All but you. I'm sorry Steve.

When I found the paladium substitute, everything worked fine for a while, then it started to, well, not. I tried every possible method available to find another element, quite obviously, to no avail. JARVIS helped me calculate how long I had left and the team helped me arrange how exactly I would spend my final days. The miracles of modern technology, I got it down to the time. In better circumstances, I would gloat, but I'll save it for your sake.

Steve, I'm begging you to please not be hard on the team. Don't think, not even for a second, that they took it fine. They didn't. It took a lot out of them and it really did hurt them. I imagine it was agony, living with me and knowing how little life I had left and that is why I didn't tell you. I wanted to save you the pain and at the same time I told them so they could aid me in it. I wanted our last moments together to be our very best, and if it's not too bold of me, I think I kind of succeeded, no? In all the retrospect I can now manage, I see maybe I should have told you and prepared you. And saved you all the aditional pain you are experiencing now. It was extremely selfish of me to have wanted the man I loved to look at me with nothing but love, instead of pity and sadness in his eyes and for that I am again sorry.

This is the point in the letter where I suppose I should tell you to try and move on, Steve. That it's not worth the wonderful human being that you are, all this sadness and sorrow. I won't say forget, because I really wouldn't want you to either, hah. But please, for me, keep on living. Life is for the living to enjoy and not, to dwell on the deceased. Trust me, I know.  
I'm not entirely sure if there is a heaven. Or if I have any chance of getting in for that matter, but if there is life after death, then I want you to know that I am here. I am with you and I am watching you and there is no need for you to feel sad or hurt, because I am still alive with you. All you need to do is think and I'll be there. This may not be at all possible and chances are I'm just hurting you further with this letter, throwing salt on fresh wounds, as they call it. Hell, maybe you've recovered by now and all my sappy bullshit talk is just me being my arrogant self, altough from a purely self-centered point of view I sincerely hope not.  
What I meant to say was, I don't want my death to cripple you in any way. We shared some beautiful times together and had we lived a hundred, a thousand or a million years we would have shared a lot more and the love I felt for you.... Steve... is not equaled to the love I have ever felt for anyone else. And from the roots of that love I beg you to keep going.   
Keep living and don't give up.  
Please.   
For me.  
And if there is an afterlife, we shall be in it together. Forever.

 

 

Oh and before I finish this letter off, because being so clumsy and "all about me" oh typical Tony, I wanted to finish it off with something reassuring and romantic, well there goes that.

Please let the guys help you. I know they care deeply about you as they cared deeply about me. We are a team and we always stand by one another, all the help they offered me just proved that further. Let them in. Let them give you the comfort you need to get over this.  
Get back in the Avengers.  
They need you to be strong, Cap.  
America needs you to pull through.  
And so does the world for that matter.  
Most of all... I need you to.

Love,  
Tony."

Steve crushed the letter tightly to his chest. He had been crying all the way through reading it and had been extremely careful not to get any teardrops on the paper. But by now he had either calmed down a bit, if that was at all possible, or he had just cried all the tears he could cry, an altogether more probable reason.   
Regardless, the tears had stopped flowing and Tony's letter had reassured him. It was true. All he had said. He would always be with him and altough he had always believed that, this letter, like the soft touch of Tony's hand on his shoulder, him whispering softly into his ear, had made him feel.... better. Something he really, truly hadn't felt in a while.   
He got up and wiped the tears from his face.  
His knees were still wobbly and his faint smile was tinted with a tinge of sadness.  
The sharp pain in his heart had subsided a bit, but was, umistakably still present.  
Regardless of all his symptoms he clutched the letter and in his heart heard a whisper:   
"It's what he would have wanted."  
Breathing out a sigh as if the weight of a whole world had been lifted off his shoulders - it had- he glanced around once more, before heading for the door.

"Sir? Sir? Where are you going?" JARVIS' metallic voice asked as he was stepping out of the lab.  
"To the new HQ I-"   
he truly didn't know how to go about compleeting that sentence. He couldn't explain this sudden change in his demeanour.  
"- I think... I think the team needs me. Or I need them, rather. And anyway..."  
a smile, his first real smile in months, flashed across his mouth  
".... Tony needs me to keep going."

With that, he left the lab and JARVIS emitted, what was as close to a sigh as his robotic mouth could muster and said, to everyone and really, to no one:

"Welcome back, Captain."


End file.
